Memories Of Youth......A Personal Account Poem by John Tansey

Memories of youth...

my toes, splayed open,
fingering the sand, deeper
as the undertow rushes toward the sea
racing me, backward, unto the past...

The whole horizon, enlarging before me.

For once, as a little boy, coming home,
at night, from the movie drive-in,
pretending I was asleep
in the backseat of my father's car.

I sucked on a lollipop, it was fall
and the leaves were crackling
under the white wall tires...

The speckled shadows of them, by street light,
reflecting on the Naugahyde seats.

And I felt the turns of the car banking,
like a starling within its flock, in Autumn.

O', how long it has been since my feet
were off the ground,
kicking them
like a little school boy on a bus...

and I still believed in the movies